Syria: Rebellion, Jihad, or Civil War?

No intervention or dissident group can control the freewheeling revolution.

Re-elected President Barack Obama’s first foreign policy challenge is likely to be Syria and one has to hope that he will have the wisdom to avoid grasping the nettle. After watching last week’s video of rebels lining up twenty-eight captured soldiers and executing them at close range with machine guns, one might well ask what has been going on in that country. It is the repetition of a familiar pattern for the US, beginning with fundamental failures on the part of Washington and its surrogates to understand the internal dynamics of a foreign land, resulting in bad decisions that have produced even worse results. Since 9/11 the United States has invaded two countries and interfered with a heavy hand in a handful more, with nary a good outcome to be seen. If Washington has a genuine national interest that is at stake in Syria, it would be that the country stay united and stable to keep it from becoming the latest playground for Jihadi warriors. Inevitably perhaps, it appears to be dissolving in chaos and that is precisely what it has become.

The Syrian debacle began as part of the Arab Spring in March 2011 as demonstrations swept the country demanding the ouster of President Bashar al-Assad and a new constitution that would remove the Ba’ath Party from power. The Ba’ath Party was then and is now dominated by Alawites, a sect of Shi’ite Islam. Al-Assad is himself an Alawite but has a British-born wife and is regarded as non-religious. Sunnis, the majority religious group in the country long resentful of Ba’athist Alawite rule, joined minority Kurds in the initial demonstrations, which were violently suppressed by the government.

Syria is a one-party state and its human rights record is abysmal, manifesting itself in arbitrary arrests, torture, beatings, and strict control over the media. A state of emergency was in effect from 1963 until April 2011, when it was lifted by presidential decree in an attempt to satisfy some of the demonstrators’ demands. There are no less than sixteen security agencies operating within the Syrian government, all of which have unlimited authority to arrest civilians. Nevertheless, the regime has considerable support. The Alawites constitute 12% of the population but are overrepresented in the bureaucracy and security services while having the most to lose with regime change. A large Christian minority has watched watched carefully the calamities inflicted on co-religionists in neighboring Iraq and is appreciative of the protection provided by the Ba’ath regime, the only remaining secular government in any Arab country. And the business class in Aleppo and Damascus has a major interest in avoiding an Iraq-type scenario that will inevitably lead to the loss of their privileged position as new rulers will inevitably move to reward their supporters. As protest demonstrations increased in size and intensity in late 2011, large counter-demonstrations also began to occur in support of the regime in Damascus and Aleppo, some orchestrated by the government but others spontaneously.

A major crackdown by the police and army in the summer of 2011 led to a hardening of the opposition. Soldiers and policemen reportedly began to defect and a flow of arms from Turkey funded by Saudi Arabia and Qatar gradually turned a political protest into something approaching a civil war. The supply of weapons increased in the fall, some apparently coming from former Gaddafi arsenals in Libya, leading to the formation of the Free Syrian Army, allegedly made up of deserters from the Syrian armed forces. A political wing, called the Syrian National Council, also came into being, made up of exiles in Europe and the United States. It began to lobby heavily in both the US and Europe for a humanitarian intervention and its activities have sometimes been compared to those of the Iraqi National Congress of 2002-3.

By early 2012, protests had been replaced by armed conflict, mostly concentrated along the Turkish border and in the country’s southwest. In June the Turkish government may have deliberately ordered a penetration of Syrian airspace which resulted in a warplane being shot down. Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who had together with a number of European and Arab nations been clandestinely supporting the rebels, declared “Turkey will support the Syrian people in every way until they get rid of the bloody dictator and his gang.” By July fighting was country-wide while Russia and China vetoed a US-backed UN resolution to sanction the regime.

The White House sees Syria as a prime target for humanitarian intervention, though the atrocities appear to be the work of both sides and numbers are elusive. The Free Syrian Army has been estimated to number anywhere between 1,000 and 25,000 and the claim that it is composed primarily of deserters has been challenged. Total deaths, one quarter of which might consist of Syrian soldiers and policemen, appear to exceed 30,000, but the numbers frequently are derived from opposition sources that would be seeking to hype the record. Indeed, Western media coverage of the conflict has generally reflected the rebel point of view and ignored the government claim of outside interference stoking the flames, which has more than a grain of truth to it. There is no authoritative body count in Syria, any more than there has been in neighboring Iraq.

If there has ever been a situation that makes the case for non-intervention, it would be Syria. But the role of Washington in the Syrian conflict is not terribly clear and a lot depends on where one looks. At the UN and State Department there have been repeated calls for Assad to leave. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton demanded in June that Assad step down and depart the country while President Barack Obama has declared that the US is “doing everything [it] can” to help the opposition. CIA, operating out of Turkey, has been helping the rebels with small arms, training, and some intelligence on army movements. But its more important task has been vetting the rebels to determine if they are truly reformers and friendly to the United States or, alternatively, Jihadis exploiting the situation as they did in Libya and to a certain extent in Iraq. A new al-Qaeda springing up in the heart of the Arab world at the center of a failed state is everyone’s most persistent nightmare.

Ironically, the limited US and other foreign support to the rebellion has made it viable while creating a compelling narrative, opening the door to an influx of Jihadis which has changed the nature of the beast. Independent observers had long noted the shifting face of the conflict but President Obama only belatedly touched on the central issue, asking in the final presidential debate whether the US is “absolutely certain that we know who we are helping.” Even Mitt Romney, being pressured by Republican politicians eager to enter the fray on behalf of the rebels, noted that any weapons provided must not get into “the wrong hands.” There are plenty of wrong hands out there, quite clearly, particularly as the rebellion’s political leadership appears to be somewhat out of touch, largely consisting as it does of exiles who have not been inside Syria for decades. The New York Timesdescribed the Syrian National Council as given to bickering and “far more caught up in fighting over spots on travel delegations than in creating an effective transitional government.” Its armed wing the Free Syrian Army (FSA) is meanwhile increasingly becoming radicalized.

The FSA claims that it can manage the still relatively small number of Jihadis, but can it? The evidence suggests that the FSA command actually does not control many fighting units and that groups in the forefront of the fight are disproportionately made up of the foreign volunteers. It has also been reported that the Jihadis are currently receiving most of the available weapons. After the fighting is over, an armed and organized minority having clear objectives competing for control with a fractured majority will have certain advantages. Recognizing that, United States Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has most recently provided names of suitable candidates while calling for the creation of a new leadership group for the Syrian rebels, presumably individuals cherry picked to support American interests, which will inevitably include minority rights and freedom of speech. She warned that the revolution might otherwise be “hijacked.” Russia, which had agreed to support a transitional government for Syria in June, is pushing back, aware that it is an end run by Washington to introduce its own proxies. But Hillary should recall that similar promises to bring democracy were made by “reformers” in Libya, Tunisia, and Egypt and it is clear that even the Taliban know how to play that game. Promises made to Washington are promises meant to be broken.

Philip Giraldi, a former CIA officer, is executive director of the Council for the National Interest.

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14 Responses to Syria: Rebellion, Jihad, or Civil War?

Foreign policy adventurism is like playing lottery. It is so absurd and idiotic, it shouldn’t need a refute. But somehow the new conservatives in US, UK, and orbit countries feel that every rebel must be supported, and every stable government should be toppled. How this new ‘wisdom’ was established? Is there a giant conspiracy to keep muslim countries forever poor and chaotic? I personally think the main motivation is that all wars helps domestic fascism, secondly I think adventurism appeals to the bored bureaucrats: “yeah, I am bored and I don’t have a real work to do, so let’s have a chess game with Russia and Iran, yeah”.

Andrew:
Somehow you missed this part:
If there has ever been a situation that makes the case for non-intervention, it would be Syria. But the role of Washington in the Syrian conflict is not terribly clear and a lot depends on where one looks. At the UN and State Department there have been repeated calls for Assad to leave. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton demanded in June that Assad step down and depart the country while President Barack Obama has declared that the US is “doing everything [it] can” to help the opposition. CIA, operating out of Turkey, has been helping the rebels with small arms, training, and some intelligence on army movements. But its more important task has been vetting the rebels to determine if they are truly reformers and friendly to the United States or, alternatively, Jihadis exploiting the situation as they did in Libya and to a certain extent in Iraq.

One should note that the protests never were very peacefull to begin with, I would imagine that burning down police stations and hanging policemen by occupy wall street would also lead to severe repression in the USA.

Assad was actually trying to prevent extreme repression and even make some amends (he declared that some early victims of police violence were “martyrs” which entails sizeable financial benefits for them and their families), however the rank and file of the Syrian security apparatus is signficantly more repressive than he is, there is also a standing order to not shoot at peacefull demonstrators, which is not infrequently ignored.

Syria also has sizeable non violent domestic oppositions which are strongly against a foreign intervention, compared to the exclusively Sunni FSA, this civilian opposition also features Christians and Alawites, and is completely marginalized in the western discource.

It is also evident that Assad entered a Faustian bargain with the PKK (who is Faust and who is Mephisto in this is a good question), an alternative hypothesis for the shot down turkish fighter is the PKK demanding a clear proof that the Syrian arab army is willing to shoot and kill turks.
Given that the Turkish airforce bombs northern Iraq whenever they feel like it, they shouldnt exactly be complaining about others shooting down their fighters if they violate others airspace.

The least bad possiblitiy for Syria is a Lebanon style power sharing agreement.
The Civil war is excessivly unlikely to end on its own. The rebells are an insurgency with several safe heavens around the country they are fighting it, which renders Assads total victory unlikely. However, the Assads and with him the Alawites perceive themselfs to be fighting for their very existence, and their will to persist is significant at will be difficult for the insurgency to erode.

1) Iran cannot be attack by Israel Or the US until the threat of the Syrian and Lebanese Hizballah missiles arsenals are eliminated or at at least degraded.

2) To do that, Israel has to attack Hizballah via the Bekaa Valley, as Colonel Pat Lang pointed out after the 2006 attempt.

3) To do that, Syria has to cross into Syria and thus engage the Syrian military. While Israel could do that, it would not be an optimum strategy.

4) BUT IF Syria were ALREADY under attack by the US and NATO a la Libya, Israel could do it.

5) Russia and China have blocked repeated attempts by the US to get Chapter 7 language in UN Syrian resolutions.

6) In response, Turkey and the insurgents have attempted to drag Turkey in by firing mortars into Turkey, so the West can bypass the UN by using a NATO Chapter 5 resolution to initiate a foreign military intervention.

7) But Assad has been careful not to provoke Turkey enough to justify this – so far.

8) So now Israel and the insurgents are trying to provoke Israel into responding to alleged Syrian “accidents”.

9) And if all else fails, there is still the alleged “spillover” and humanitarian crisis” which is being used to justify sending UK troops to Syria’s border and other moves.

The goal is not necessarily just to oust Assad, but to degrade Syria’s military – and then Hizballah in Lebanon – so they are not effective actors in an Iran war.

There is no way the insurgents can beat the Syrian military – or degrade Syria’s missile capability – without foreign military intervention. There is no way Assad can win as long as the insurgents have massive external support.

Therefore there MUST BE a foreign military intervention. This will be followed by an Israeli attack on Lebanon.

I am not sure how to answer this question with regard to Syria. Was the revolution really spontaneous or was it “helped” from the start? The very early reports of involvement of western spy networks in Syria does not help in answering. The incessant flow of requests from western leaders on al-Assad to step down, and his non-stop demonization by western media does not help either. Western politicians are talking about the end of hostilities, but they never tried to shut down arms channeling to the country. Annan plan was deemed to be unsuccessful days before it actually started (at the meeting of so called “Friends of Syria”). It does not appear to me that west ever acted actually “in good faith” towards government of Syria. In this regard I find this article incomplete. On the other hand I know the author made a honest try – I like his mention of Aleppo, which was free of violence up until late summer 2012. Aleppo is a significant piece in my opinion since it has always been a mixed population city with sizable Sunni population living in a peace with all others while Sunni rebels elsewhere in the country were having a revolution. I remember killing of well known Sunni clan from Aleppo by FSA after the revolution has come to the city precisely for that inter-faith peace this clan adhered to.

The so-called Syrian rebels are a crude mixture of al Qaeda, bought and paid for malcontents and NATO special forces . al Qaeda is an invented or fictional grouping of the same but Mossad/CIA created ‘guns for hire’. Israel, the US and NATO are sponsoring terrorism (providing weekly pay-checks to terrorists) across the board in Syria and elsewhere. The purpose is to ensure Israel’s regional dominance by plunging the entire middle east into perpetual chaos, destroying their militaries, civilian infrastructure and scientific capabilities. After Syria, then Iran followed by Pakistan. That’s the plan. However, the Zionists strategy is known to everybody, so a general war is in the making, because no is in control of this process. It is unfolding with its own mementum now. Get ready!

It’s easy to forget that it all boils down to the US, England, and Israel having unfettered access to the natural resources of the world. Nothing else really matters, and paper money is simply a convenient distraction. So it appears that Syria has become the latest country to fall victim of a strategy centered round the concept that the resources of a nation can be more easily and cheaply acquired if the nation is destroyed, not by direct military invasion, but by social destabilization followed by civil war; during which time the nation’s natural resources and other hard assets can be looted by the global banking cartel. Although (due to the staying power of Saddam Hussein) Iraq eventually required a military invasion, the tactic worked well in that country and appears to be in various stages of developement in Egypt, Libya, Yemen, Somalia and now Syria. Due to the inherent stability of the Mullahs in Iran, a military invasion may eventually be required for the purpose of gaining access to that county’s immense wealth.